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Averill, Gage: Four Parts, No Waiting

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Author Gage Averill is Professor of Ethnomusicology and Chair of the Music Department at New York University. For history buffs and barbershop aficionados,it's a fascinating (if somewhat controversial) read.

Averill weighs in on the question of barbershop's ethnic heritage. He says it is "creolized" - i.e., a creation from a mixture of musics, including Austrian folk songs, blackface minstrel songs, African-American recreational harmonists and pioneer recording quartets. He also argues that barbershop has influenced a wide array of subsequent American music idioms, and it "deserve[s] to be much better understood as a musical and social practice." You'll be surprised to learn which giants of ragtime, jazz and blues started out as barbershoppers.

His account of the 2000 International in Kansas City hints that he's been charmed by the esprit de corps of modern-day barbershoppers. But he also has some comments of relevance to the perennial issue of "what is barbershop." He observes that barbershop as performed within SPEBSQSA, since the beginning of what he calls the "revival" in the 1930s, has been sanitized, regimented and refocused on nostalgia. In other words, it represents a narrow piece of what was a varied and dynamic musical genre.

While his occasional use of academic jargon is off-putting, for most of the historical narrative he deftly manages to combine a wealth of facts with important perspectives. Every serious barbershopper should read this book!
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